May Bumps and June Cygnets

On June 13, 14, and 16 we turned out to cheer on the top Newnham College rowing team in the Cambridge "May Bumps."

The "May Bumps" race is, I'm told, the world's largest intra-collegiate sporting event. Since the river is too narrow to race side by side, the boats start a length and a half behind each other. If they bump into or otherwise catch the boat ahead of them, the two teams switch places in the next heat. This means that the race never ends, as the starting line up for next year's Bumps is set by the standings at the end of this year's series of races. The men's race has been on-going since 1887, the women's (because Cambridge), only started in 1974. In this heat, Newnham is about to bump Emmanuel (College), I believe:

This year Newnham's top team moved from 4th to 2nd place in the first division. In the final race, they came a close second behind Jesus (College):

If you are wondering why the "May Bumps" are held in June, the short answer is "Because Cambridge." The longer answer is that the race (and associated festivities) interfered so much with final exams that the university moved the race to Mid-June when exams are over. Cambridge "May Balls" are also held in June for the same reason.

While we were waiting for our 5 minutes of boating action we also kept our eye on THE swan on THE nest in THE middle of THE Cam:

t. came home from a jog scouting expedition on Thursday with the news that at least one of the cygnets had hatched. Today, on our family outing to Waterbeach, we encountered several swan families:

Since swans abandon their nests within 48 hours after the eggs hatch, we expected THE nest to be empty, but we were surprised when we finally found THE swan family with its three young cygnets past Baits Bite Lock: